Just a thought on history

[nmrt]

was walking my dog in the morning today and i stumbled upon a thought. what if the current mass produced carbon bikes that some call monstrously ugly were actually produced in the 70s and 80s? would we look back at them as timeless pieces of art?

and what if the vintage steel bike with intricate lugs were actually mass produced currently? would we call them ugly and effete?

[Jgrooms]

Get off my lawn!


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[bicycletricycle]

Maybe

[tiretrax]

Only those from low production and boutique firms.

[Dead Man]

Probably, yea..

I don't remember what it's called.... some ________ bias....

Old stuff is classic and better because the ONLY old stuff that survives into the present is the best of the old stuff.

Old music is so much better because all of the crappy old music has been filtered out. Oldies and classic rock stations dont play BAD old music - they only play the good stuff. So all we hear, from the old days, is the hits... makes it sound like all the old stuff was good.

Same thing would apply with bikes. If it'd been all old carbon.. all the classic carbon frames would still be loved and repro'd today. Steel wouldn't be all beautifully lugged/painted steel - there's be all kinds of wacky crap that will be later filtered out, for future generations. So yea, steel would seem unartistic and junky/clunky in general because of all the extra white noise.

[Dead Man]

People would see those beautiful flowing "classic" carbon lines and pine about the good old days when bikes were shaped and molded things of beauty. Forgetting that there were 10 junk designs for every successful/beautiful frame.

[bcroslin]

I would like some of what you're smoking....

[FlashUNC]

http://i.imgur.com/ufF0F.jpg

[Ronsonic]

There are so many things of the 60s and 70s that if remembered at all repel the senses.

Men's fashions or interior decorating. Here, let me send you off to see the master of retro tastelessness (http://www.lileks.com/#everything).

Vintage lugged steel is beautiful because it evolved over a century of very smart, hardworking men shaping it into functional perfection. A VISP is grotesque because it was slapped together by people with no understanding of the function or use of the thing while skimping on even the engineering budget.

There are carbon bikes that will be remembered well and will look good in retrospect. Then there are the others.

[steamer]

Let's make bike frames great again.